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By *Danielle Sabai* [This article was written before the Thai government's crushing of the Red Shirts' protest site in Bangkok on May 19, 2010. However, it provides important background to the events.] May 17, 2010 -- The political crisis engulfing Thailand is not a clap of thunder in an otherwise calm sky. The discourse about a country where “everyone lives in harmony and where there is no class struggle but a people united behind its adored sovereign” has nothing to do with reality. For several decades, the Thai people have been subjected to authoritarian regimes or dictatorships and a king in their service. The Thai élites have however not succeeded in preventing regular uprisings against the established order, including those in 1973, 1976 and 1992, all repressed by bloodbaths. Since 2005, Thailand has faced a new and deep political crisis, longer than the previous ones, and whose outcome cannot be, as in the past, the stifling of the aspirations of the Thai people. The economic boom of the period from 1986-1996 has brought about irreversible changes in society, notably the formation of a working class of around 7 million and structural political reforms. Unlike in previous crises, ordinary Thais – peasants, urban workers and the middle classes of Bangkok, the less well-off – have become conscious of their political weight and begun to make demands. Full article at http://links.org.au/node/1696 More coverage of the Thai crisis at http://links.org.au/taxonomy/term/296 ********************************* Subscribe free to Links International Journal of Socialist Renewal at http://www.feedblitz.com/f/?Sub=343373 You can also follow Links on Twitter at http://twitter.com/LinksSocialism Or join the Links Facebook group at http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=10865397643 ________________________________________________ Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
